


those nights

by alpacasandravens



Category: Gotham (TV)
Genre: M/M, No Man's Land, Non-Chronological, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-21
Updated: 2020-01-21
Packaged: 2021-02-27 06:54:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,882
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22352932
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alpacasandravens/pseuds/alpacasandravens
Summary: “Friend.” The word is so soft as to be almost unintelligible, and Bruce thinks it probably came from an original sentence where the other words were too quiet to be heard. Something like ‘You’re my friend.’This was complicated territory. Bruce is glad Jonathan considers them to be friends, but he’s not sure if he would consider Jonathan his friend. At sixteen, Jonathan was an enemy, and at nineteen he would have liked to use the word ‘boyfriend,’ and now - enemy again? ‘Friend’ seems like an oversimplification.It's never simple, not in No Man's Land or when Bruce returns to Gotham after 10 years, but they do their best.
Relationships: Jonathan Crane/Bruce Wayne
Comments: 5
Kudos: 57





	those nights

**Author's Note:**

  * For [aestethic](https://archiveofourown.org/users/aestethic/gifts).



> for @aestethic who gave me the idea for this!! title is only sort of referencing 'those nights' by bastille

Bruce is seventeen. He walks onto the roof of the newly opened Iceberg Lounge. It is the second time he has done this (the second time tonight, too), but it will not be the last. 

Selina is long gone, and the roof is empty. Even Alfred had known to let him have a few moments alone. Downstairs was chaos, with Penguin and Jim and that gang, and Bruce had done the best he could but he can’t help but feel it hadn’t been enough. 

It is always cloudy in Gotham. This is before the total darkness of No Man’s Land; the city is still lit from a thousand streetlights, a million windows. The yellow light bounces off the roof of clouds, turning them a sickly shade of gray. Bruce looks up at them and sighs. 

Gotham is sick. He can see it in the sky, and he can hear it in the sirens leaving the club, unable to arrest the most corrupt man in Gotham even after he attempted murder in front of hundreds of witnesses. And he’s trying to help, _he is_ , but it’s so _hard_. It hasn’t been so long since he was arrested for trying to stop a robbery, after all.

The stairwell door creaks open behind Bruce, casting another small beam of yellow into the night. 

“Come along, Master Bruce,” Alfred says in that tone of his, the one that he uses when he’s worried and on his last nerve and only thinly masking it with politeness.

Bruce turns around slowly. 

“Time to go, now,” Alfred says.

Bruce nods. “Thank you, Alfred.”

Gotham is sick, and he’s working to cure it. But it’s so hard, taking on a city by yourself.

Several miles away, in a rundown house just far enough from the city that it truly gets dark, there is a boy in a closet. He’s been there for so long that he’s stopped screaming, stopped beating on the door and trying to get away from his attacker. He sits, head down, eyes closed, wearing the attacker’s clothes. There is a pile of straw in the corner.

This is how the man finds him. “You still in there, kid?” He yells. “Need more a’ that gas!”

When the man opens the door, the boy rises, and it is not the boy at all but the Scarecrow, and he hopes with all the twisted anger in his heart that this will be the last thing the man ever sees.

*

Bruce is nineteen. It is his third night on guard duty, and if he were anyone else, he would have been bored. But it’s Bruce Wayne, and he’s had so much going through his head for so long he doesn’t think he knows how to be bored. Ever since -- ever since that day in the alley, he’s thought about strategy, about how to best examine every inch, every thought, of Gotham City. About how to stay alive, and how to make sure as many other people as possible stayed that way. About mapping each part of the city into his brain, understanding them so that he could understand every molecule that made up his Gotham.

Gotham has changed so much since the bridges blew. Instead of hiding, every monster the city had churned out over the last seven years is thriving, gathering their followers and taking their territory. All except for two. There are no Valeskas. One Bruce had watched die (twice, so that doesn’t mean much), and the other is definitely still out there, using his obsession with Bruce to do who knows what. So Bruce takes guard duty. Because there are so many things the Green Zone needs to be guarded from.

Something moves in the dark across the street. It’s on the other side of the barricade, but Bruce readies his walkie-talkie just in case. He won’t take a gun or any lethal weapon, but he can let the people inside know of any possible danger. 

The shadows shift again, and Bruce brings out his binoculars to get a better look. It’s so dark, and even through his night vision he can’t see much, but there is a distinct figure standing near the street corner. The figure appears tall and thin, and has hair nearly down to their shoulders. They salute in Bruce’s direction before disappearing behind a building.

Bruce watches for the rest of the night, but there is no further movement. As the sun starts to rise, Harper taps on his shoulder. She and Bruce swap places in silence.

“Watch that corner,” Bruce says as he’s almost gone. “I thought I saw something earlier.”

Harper raises an eyebrow and nods.

*

Bruce is twenty-nine, and he’s been back in Gotham for two weeks. In those two weeks, he’s been to no less than four receptions, though thankfully only the first had been rigged to explode. (There had been a juggler with real knives that came awfully close to hitting Bruce at another, though. As assassination attempts went, it had been a poor one, and Bruce had honestly hoped Gotham was done with all the circus-themed madness anyway.)

This one doesn’t seem to be deadly, unless you count dying from annoyance. Bruce isn’t a part of this upper-class socialite world, not really, and it’s exhausting having to put on that mask so often. He knows how much good he can do as Bruce Wayne, but there’s something about the gossip of the rich and useless that makes him feel like exactly that -- useless.

He makes his excuses to the woman he was talking to (the mayor’s wife, perhaps, though he can’t be sure) and steps outside. This particular reception is taking place in a hotel, one of the older ones that had somehow survived No Man’s Land. It’s old enough to have a ballroom instead of a conference room, anyway, and the ballroom has a balcony attached.

The ballroom is on the third floor, but looking down from the edge of the balcony, it feels higher. Gotham is busy again, car horns honking and laughter floating up from the sidewalk even at this late hour. It always makes Bruce’s heart feel full, to see his city recovering like this. It was still crazy, and its criminals (which he may as well call villains now, as it’s what they called themselves) were crazier. But it is alive, and after it had been dark for so long, Bruce hadn’t been sure it would ever recover. He is almost sad he hadn’t been here to see it happen.

There is a rustling beside him, and when Bruce turns to look, the Scarecrow is perched on the balcony railing, just out of the light. 

“This is the least creative murder attempt I’ve seen recently,” Bruce says.

The Scarecrow cocks its head to the side. “Murder attempt?” It says with a hint of a laugh behind its words.

“I should warn you, I’m a yellow belt in karate. Don’t come any closer.” It’s a joke, and they know it. Bruce is a double black belt, and trained in so many other martial arts besides. 

“You aren’t scared of me.”

It might be Bruce’s imagination, but the Scarecrow sounds almost insulted.

“No.”

“You should be.”

“Why?” They’ve been meeting like this for so long now. It’s not as exhausting as talking to the reception guests, and it’s not as draining as fighting one of the city’s villains on a real crime spree, so in the grand scheme of things, it’s one of the least scary things in Bruce’s life. “Are you going to hurt me?”

Bruce isn’t afraid of pain, but he’s built up his persona as a selfish, overindulged trust fund kid. He can’t break that down, not in front of someone he knows he will fight time and again as the Batman.

There is a long silence before the Scarecrow speaks. “...No,” it says.

“I could call the GCPD.”

“If you were going to, you would have already.”

“You don’t know me,” Bruce says, willing his voice to sound shaky, like he’s nervous. “I could!”

“I don’t… know you,” the Scarecrow says slowly. He takes a deep breath that through his mask sounds like something out of a horror movie. “I thought I knew you. Lonelykidonthebarricadeinthedark.”

“I’m not a kid anymore, Jonathan. And you’re the only one still in the dark.” Bruce is too tired to play games. He folds his arms and waits.

The Scarecrow doesn’t answer. It huffs and picks itself up off the railing, disappearing into the dark.

Bruce returns to the reception, plastering a smile on his face.

*

Bruce is nineteen, and he’s walking up to his shift on guard duty. It’s still early, so the sun is just starting to sink behind the gutted silhouettes of the Gotham skyline. He prepares himself for a long night ahead.

It doesn’t take long for the light to fade. Night has always come quickly in Gotham, the daylight never that bright to begin with, muffled by clouds and smog, almost skipping dusk in its rush toward the dark. When Bruce was little, he didn’t notice. Outside of the city, where Wayne Manor sits, night is not in such a hurry, danger doesn’t lurk around every corner in the dark. 

Now, of course, danger is present even in the day. No Man’s Land is home to only the worst of Gotham’s criminal classes - and those in the Green Zone, the unfortunates who couldn’t or wouldn’t leave. 

There are no streetlights anymore. There haven’t been for some time, not since the government cut the power. So Bruce can’t see the person who taps him on the shoulder, but he doesn’t have to. He springs up silently, bringing the person down with a kick to the back of the knees and an arm shoved against their throat.

“Easy,” the person laughs. The voice is scratchy but still young, probably belonging to someone around Bruce’s age. Bruce doesn’t recognize it, but that doesn’t mean much. He doesn’t know the majority of Gotham’s inhabitants. 

“Who are you?” Bruce asks, not moving.

“My name’s Jonathan.” He doesn’t sound worried, despite being pinned to the ground. “I’m not here to hurt you. I just thought you might be lonely.”

“Who sent you?”

“No one. Myself.” There is a pause, and Jonathan’s next word is uncertain, as though he’s weighing the benefits of saying it. “I’m from Haven.”

It’s then that Bruce moves, letting Jonathan up. No one from the Dark Zone should know about Haven; it’s too new. Barely even a week old, but still overcrowded. 

“Thanks.” Jonathan sits up, crouching on his toes next to Bruce.

“Jim really didn’t send you?” Bruce asks. He knows Jim has been worried; and with all that Jeremiah had done to Bruce before disappearing, he has a right to be. But Bruce is fine, he’s told Jim that a million times, and even if it’s a lie, he still wishes Jim would take a step back.

“No. Like I said, I just thought it seemed lonely up here.”

Bruce hums in agreement. Guard duty isn’t the most thrilling of jobs, but it is necessary. And he doesn’t enjoy being snuck up on, not in this city.

They don’t talk much, and Bruce never moves his night vision binoculars to look at Jonathan, but he’s right. It is nice having someone else with him.

*

Bruce is twenty-nine, and this is the third time in the past four months that he’s ducked out onto a balcony or into a garden to escape society and been confronted with the Scarecrow. He’s starting to think this might be something he’s going to have to get used to.

“Are you stalking me, or have I unwittingly distracted you from committing crimes every time I’ve run into you?” 

Scarecrow does not answer. The silence feels sullen.

“I choose to believe I’ve stopped several robberies,” Bruce jokes. “I’ve got better luck than the GCPD!”

The night air is silent and thick, the noise of the party inside completely blocked by the balcony’s thick glass doors. They are on the outskirts of the city, and this balcony overlooks a courtyard, which means Scarecrow’s irritated tapping of one nail on his glass toxin vials is louder than the distant traffic.

“I could just as easily rob you,” he observes.

“That would be an entirely unwelcome change of pace. Also, it would be inconvenient.”

Scarecrow drags the silence out for a beat before sighing. “I am not going to rob you. Or them.” He waves a hand to the partygoers inside.

“Thank you.”

“You knew I wouldn’t.”

Bruce nods.

“You’re thanking me for not robbing you,” he says with a dry laugh, taking off the hood of his costume. Underneath it, his long hair sticks up in tangles, and his face looks sunken even where he hasn’t painted the hollows black for his costume. He looks drained.

“Yes,” Bruce nods again. “I appreciate it.”

“I was going to rob you, the first time.”

“Why didn’t you?”

Jonathan does not answer. Bruce does not rush him, but neither does he say anything else. 

After a pointed raising of Bruce’s eyebrows, Jonathan says “I couldn’t rob _you_.”

“Why not?” Bruce asks. “I’m certainly not lacking in valuable possessions.”

Jonathan jumps onto the railing and crouches there, balancing in a move that reminds Bruce of Selina. She hates answering personal questions, and as Jonathan concentrates intently on running the tip of the fear toxin syringe over the railing again and again, Bruce thinks they are similar in that way.

“Friend.” The word is so soft as to be almost unintelligible, and Bruce thinks it probably came from an original sentence where the other words were too quiet to be heard. Something like ‘You’re my friend.’

This was complicated territory. Bruce is glad Jonathan considers them to be friends, but he’s not sure if he would consider Jonathan his friend. At sixteen, Jonathan was an enemy, and at nineteen he would have liked to use the word ‘boyfriend,’ and now - enemy again? ‘Friend’ seems like an oversimplification.

The silence stretches out between them until Bruce says “I should get back inside.”

“Why did you choose a bat?” Jonathan asks at almost the same moment. Like he’s been waiting for the right time.

“Why did I-” Bruce laughs incredulously. He turns on the charm, the tone that’s made so many people absolutely certain there was just empty air and money behind his pretty face. “I’m afraid I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

Jonathan rolls his eyes. He is more confident when he is the one asking questions. “Why did you choose a bat?” He repeats.

“I’m not the Batman, Jonathan. I’m Bruce Wayne.”

The look Jonathan gives him is clearly designed to make whoever is receiving it feel the weight of their own stupidity. It’s a look that’s calling Bruce on his bullshit. But Bruce is a good actor, and he’s not about to admit to being the Batman to one of his rogues, while unarmed. He’s not stupid. 

“Bats are an interesting animal,” Jonathan says. “Gentle fruit-eaters, but closely associated with Halloween. Their association with vampires doesn’t seem relevant here, but their status as a horror movie trope does. What do bats mean to you, I wonder?”

“One could ask you a similar question about scarecrows.” Bruce turns away and opens the door. The noise of the party washes over him; it is less than calming. Behind him, he hears nothing, but knows that if he turns around, Jonathan will no longer be sitting on the railing. “Goodnight, Jonathan.”

*

Bruce might be twenty. He isn’t really sure. No Man’s Land has stretched on forever, and though he knows Jim is keeping track of every day, Bruce isn’t. There’s no point, anymore. Jeremiah is dead, or as good as, and reunification has been indefinitely postponed after the recent incident with the poison fireworks in the river. 

Jonathan doesn’t visit him every night he’s on guard duty, but it’s become an often enough occurrence that Bruce finds himself disappointed when he spends his shift alone. Today, it is early spring, and Jonathan is with him as the perpetual wind whips through the streets and the weeds slowly push through the cracks in the sidewalk.

Jonathan rests his head on Bruce’s shoulder. Bruce doesn’t know what he means by that, but it’s cold up on the barricade, and he’s not complaining about stealing all of Jonathan’s body heat. Bruce doesn’t know why he does it, but he slides his hand into Jonathan’s, their fingers lacing together perfectly.

“Do you ever think about what happens next?”

Jonathan makes a soft, inquisitive humming noise.

“After reunification,” Bruce clarifies.

“I try not to.”

“Why not?” Sometimes, it seems that’s all Bruce can think about. Other times, like right now, it seems like a pipe dream, like the hypothetical ‘What would you do if you won the lottery?’ question, except even that seems more realistic, as he has that kind of money, and No Man’s Land might never end. 

Jonathan’s voice is low when he answers, like he hopes the wind will blow his words away before anyone hears. “Because they’ll lock me up, Bruce. They’ll put me back in that awful place and they’ll leave my crew on the streets by themselves with no one to protect them, and I can’t think about that.”

It is quiet for a long time. Bruce doesn’t know what he can say. The future is everything to him, and this is the dark time where all he and Gotham have to do is survive. And he’d forgotten, while Jonathan had curled into his side and held his hand, that Jonathan thrives here. It’s so hard to see Jonathan as the Scarecrow when they’re like this, with whatever this is going on between them, that Bruce had briefly forgotten the Scarecrow entirely. That the boy beside him is an unrepentant murderer.

“You really care about them, don’t you,” Bruce says instead.

“Of course I do. They’re kids with nowhere to go. That used to be me, and I’m damn well not letting what happened to me happen to them.”

Bruce still doesn’t know what happened to Jonathan. He won’t say, aside from general scathing remarks about Arkham’s quality of care. Bruce has long since resolved to use some of his money to restructure Arkham, as soon as he can. But that doesn’t make up for whatever Jonathan went through that left him convinced his father, the man who had given him the fear ‘vaccine’ that almost killed him, had done more for him than any doctor ever could. 

He squeezes Jonathan’s hand instead of replying.

“What will you do, after?” Jonathan asks.

“I don’t know.”

And no matter how long Bruce thinks about it, how many plans he makes, that’s the truth. He sighs.

“I don’t know.”

*

It is No Man’s Land, and Jonathan isn’t sure why he’d infiltrated the Green Zone only to sneak up on the guard. He’s on the ground, an arm pinning his throat, and he isn’t sure why he’s there. It isn’t logical, that’s for sure. If he was doing the logical thing, he would have run a reconnaissance mission tonight and led a team to steal all the Green Zone’s food and medical supplies tomorrow night. In and out, undetected.

But instead, he’d decided to come up here. Why?

Three nights ago, he’d felt eyes on him as he left from his first successful trip through the walls. And instead of staying in the shadows, blending in and making himself unnoticeable, he’d _saluted_. Informally, with only one finger, but still. He’d let himself be seen.

If he had just been curious to know who’d seen him, this was a piss-poor way of finding out. He had no way of knowing if this guard was the same one as three days ago, and he had no guarantee he wouldn’t be captured and leave his crew to fend for themselves. 

And yet.

“My name’s Jonathan,” he says, and even though it’s true it feels like a lie. ‘Jonathan’ might as well be an alias, as the only people who know the Scarecrow’s true name are the ones who’ve seen his file - doctors, all long gone from this barren city, and Jim Gordon. But he isn’t Scarecrow tonight.

He still has his night vision goggles on, though, so he sees a (albeit green and grainy) picture of the guard he’s come to meet. Jonathan has the feeling he should recognize him, thinks vaguely he’s seen this kid’s face before.

“I just thought it seemed lonely up here,” he says, and it’s more of the truth than anything else he’d spoken tonight. Because he knows what it’s like to be lonely, to be sitting behind the wheel of his father’s car while screams echo from the warehouse next to him and know that he can never tell anyone. To watch over his flock as the Dark Zone threatens them at every turn. The Scarecrow stands in a field alone, and this guard perches on the walls of the Green Zone by himself.

“I’m Bruce,” the guard says, warily. “It’s nice to meet you.”

“Likewise.”

“You shouldn’t be out at night. It isn’t safe.”

Jonathan shrugs before remembering Bruce can’t see him. “Nothing’s safe.”

Bruce is silent, and Jonathan thinks he agrees.

*

The day after Bruce meets Jonathan, he visits Haven for the first time. It is midafternoon, sun beating down but providing little warmth to combat the icy wind whipping through the buildings.

Haven is tall, listing slightly, and crammed full of people. People have beds and bedrolls shoved into nearly every available nook, fighting to claim their space because if Haven is overcrowded and has few resources, it’s still better than trying to survive in the Dark Zone. Bruce passes an entire family living in what used to be a kitchen. The building’s pool had long since been drained and now is home to nearly 20. 

There are several people in Haven named Jonathan. It’s a very common name. Two are old men, one a father of four toddlers, and three are toddlers themselves. There is no teenager named Jonathan. There is no one that looks or sounds familiar, and all the building’s residents swear they don’t know any teenage boy named Jonathan with long hair. 

Bruce kicks a loose brick when he exits the building. It skitters across the empty parking lot, falling down a sewer grate. If there is no Jonathan in Haven, that means he’d lied last night. But why? If he was from elsewhere in the Green Zone, why lie? And if he was from the Dark Zone, how did he know about Haven? And why is Bruce still alive?

That night, he is ready. Jonathan is nowhere to be found.

Three nights later, Bruce hears someone behind him. It’s Jonathan; he knows it is. No one else would make that much of an effort to be quiet. If Bruce were anyone else, he wouldn’t have heard him.

Within a second, Bruce has him pinned again. “Why are you here?” He asks.

“I was lonely.” He doesn’t sound flippant now; there’s something sad in his tone.

“You’re not from Haven.”

“You checked, then.”

“Of course I checked. How did you know about Haven? Where are you really from?” Bruce isn’t panicking, he’s too well trained for that, but he’s close. Berating himself for being so stupid as to trust this stranger.

“Where else is there to be from? I wanted to know if Haven was real, and it turns out it is.”

“So you’re from the Dark Zone.”

“Will you let me up?” Jonathan sounds tired. “If I was going to kill you, I would have done it the other night.”

Bruce narrows his eyes. “Why didn’t you?”

“World gets lonely if you go around killing everyone.” Jonathan says it like a joke, but there’s a bit of truth behind his words that disturbs Bruce. He’s killed people. But how many?

“Are you even really called Jonathan?” Bruce lets him up, knowing as he does it that it’s a bad idea.

He shrugs. “Sometimes.”

This is a lie. He has not been called Jonathan in years, not since Arkham and nurses in cold white rooms and fear everywhere he looked. 

There is a moment of silence, where Bruce thinks and Jonathan waits. Bruce keeps his hand on the knife by his leg and knows that if Jonathan attacked him, he would probably not be able to use it in time. He does not think that will happen.

“Who are you?” He asks. “Really.”

The sound of metal scraping across stone. Jonathan laughs a little, a soft, low laugh that Bruce isn’t sure he was meant to hear. “Scare-crow,” he singsongs.

Something in Bruce’s stomach is sinking. He almost can’t breathe. Why does this keep happening to him? First Jeremiah, now Jonathan - 

“I don’t want to be Scarecrow with _you_ ,” Jonathan says petulantly, all the twisted energy from a moment ago gone. “I wanted to be friends.”

Bruce snorts. Friends, sure, in the same way Jeremiah wanted to be ‘friends’ (a word that had clearly meant something very different) and had instead hurt all of Bruce’s _real_ friends. 

“I think Jeremiah’s crazy, too,” Jonathan says.

“That’s why you helped him, then.”

“I had nowhere else to go. And I didn’t know you then.”

“You don’t know me now.”

Jonathan shrugs; he is sitting close enough to Bruce that he can feel the air move. “I’d like to.”

*

No Man’s Land stretches out in all directions. Jonathan counts the days in the amount of rations he and his crew have left (not many, but enough), measures the time passing by the chill of the darkened streets. 

For some reason he cannot understand, Jonathan has not broken into the Green Zone. It isn’t out of any kind of sympathy for the people living inside, that had been burned out of him long ago. And he could use the resources. But instead, he finds himself sitting on the barricade with Bruce once again.

There have been a few times Jonathan has climbed the barricade and found someone other than Bruce sitting guard. He does not approach them. He does not warn Bruce how easily the guards could be killed by the right person, by Jonathan if he felt so inclined. Before he’d met Bruce, he thinks, he would have killed them with no hesitation. He kind of hates that he won’t now.

But he’d been right when he told Bruce that killing gets lonely after a while. He has his crew, but there’s something different about people who look up to you, rely on you, than having someone with whom you can just _be_. He likes Bruce, an alarming amount considering he’s never really liked anyone. (He might’ve liked Jerome and Tetch, he thinks, but Jerome had died so soon and then there hadn’t really been anything holding him and Tetch together anymore.) And because he likes Bruce, he raids the Sirens when his crew are running low on medicine, waits for Freeze and Firefly to start their inevitable bickering to steal food. He sits on the barricade beside Bruce, closer, he thinks, than he strictly needs to sit, with his mask off, and he talks to Bruce instead of robbing the Green Zone. With every visit, the supplies behind the walls are further from his mind.

*

Bruce is thirty, and nearing his thirty-first birthday. _Not_ that he needs reminding. He’ll have to throw a big birthday bash again, like he did last year, and feign getting spectacularly drunk until he can disappear. It’s a good thing he had enough practice, before everything, with _actually_ getting spectacularly drunk, as he doesn’t think he would be able to fake it so well otherwise.

It’s not quite time for that, though. His birthday isn’t for another month (though he knows Dick and Alfred will have something a little tamer and more genuine for him sometime sooner). Now, he’s at a fundraiser. The election cycle isn’t for another two years, but he’d agreed to appear at the mayor’s gala. Anything to stop Aubrey James - or, God forbid, Penguin - from running again. 

“...think opening a Gotham City Zoo would be an excellent idea, don’t you?” The woman he’s talking to asks. Bruce privately thinks it is sure to be attacked, probably by Ivy, within its first week of operation, but he nods along and smiles blandly.

“If you’ll excuse me,” Bruce says with a fake apologetic look. He holds up a phone that isn’t ringing, making sure the city councilwoman he’s escaping from can only see the back. “I have to take this.”

Bruce puts the phone up to his ear and slips out onto the balcony. Mingling at fundraisers like this has become his life. And damn if it isn’t draining.

As soon as he’s confident no one inside can see him, he drops his phone back into his pocket and leans against the wall. He has to be careful about how often he uses that excuse - he is the CEO of Wayne Industries, but taking too many calls might lead people to question exactly how competent he is. And while the act of having a lot of money and not a lot of brains is exhausting, it is useful.

Still, sometimes he needs a break.

There is a slight movement in the shadows in front of Bruce. The shades of black resolve themselves into the figure of the Scarecrow. In costume, the identity of its wearer is consumed entirely, the silhouette too tall and almost distorted, the eyes the only portal to the person underneath. During a crime or an experiment, those eyes would be blown out of proportion, dancing with unhinged excitement. Now, they are smiling.

“What was it this time?” 

Bruce smiles. Jonathan skitters the fingers of his left hand, the one that doesn’t have the fear gas rig attached to it, across Bruce’s cheekbone and jaw in the way that Bruce knows stands in for a kiss. Bruce turns his head in to where Jonathan’s fingers rest on his cheek. 

“A zoo. It’s probably a great idea, sure, supporting animal welfare and educating people, but I do _not_ want to talk to Ivy right now. She’s still mad the city developed the park on 4th Street. Those animals are going to be set loose as soon as they arrive, and the city council isn’t going to have to be the ones to stop her.”

Jonathan hums softly, considering. There’s a glint of mischief in his eyes when he says “I assume you don’t want -”

“ _No_ , you can’t scare them into abandoning the plan.”

Jonathan shrugs.

“No.”

“It was just an offer.” Jonathan shrugs. He had to offer, just as Bruce had to refuse.

“You know I don’t endorse you committing crimes.”

“I’m sure you’ve committed a crime,” he says, pretending to think. “Hmmm… public intoxication, maybe? Have you ever gotten a noise complaint?”

“Never,” Bruce says with mock seriousness. They have not yet entered the brief yet dark period in the history of Gotham City where the Batman tops the Most Wanted list, but they know that vigilantism is much more serious than any of the misdemeanors Bruce will sign his name to.

“How’d a criminal like me get such a law-abiding boyfriend?”

Jonathan moves to stand beside Bruce, who slips an arm around his waist. “It’s a mystery,” Bruce agrees.

They stand like that for a minute or two, reveling in each other’s presence, staring into the dimly lit streets. It is not much, but it is a moment that is theirs and no one else’s. Bruce finds himself missing it before it has even ended.

*

Bruce is thirteen, but he isn’t in this scene. Bruce is eating shepherd’s pie in the kitchen with Alfred. Selina is there, and she’s torn between laughing at something Bruce said that wasn’t supposed to be funny and just leaving, because she can’t remember ever feeling so much like she belongs, and it scares her.

Jonathan is alone. Not alone, he is never alone -- the scarecrow looms over him, burning and twisting and he screams and he screams. The doctors tell him it isn’t real, but he can barely understand them over the sight of the scarecrow cutting into his arm, over the pain and the blood that’s pouring out and why aren’t they doing anything he could die he’s dying and the doctors shake their heads and leave.

They leave him in the white room that the scarecrow sets on fire, and he screams some more. He only stops when his throat is too raw to make any noise, and even then tears silently flow down his face.

*

Bruce is twenty. He’s sure of that now. After Jeremiah fell, after he _died_ , Bruce started visiting him twice a week. Partly to finally mourn his former friend, partly to hope he would wake up, and partly to hope he wouldn’t. But the heart rate monitor continued to show a slow, steady beat, and the brain function screen continued to show nothing. Bruce has visited him twenty-three times.

It is Bruce’s last night on guard duty. It will be the last night of anyone’s guard duty, and he finds he almost misses it.

Jonathan is there, because of course he is. He is sitting against the crude railing to Bruce’s left, his legs stretched out across Bruce’s lap. There’s a sinking feeling in Bruce’s stomach as he realizes this is the last night they’ll get to have this. Whatever this is.

“They’re turning the power back on tomorrow,” he says, trusting Jonathan to understand everything that means. 

There is a long pause. “Why are you telling me?”

Bruce shrugs helplessly. He shouldn’t be. No one else in the Dark Zone knows, except probably Barbara Kean. It’ll make bringing Jonathan to justice that much harder, and Bruce is surprised to find he doesn’t care. 

“You deserve to know.”

“I’ll miss this.” Jonathan doesn’t clarify whether he means Bruce or No Man’s Land.

“Me too.” Bruce is surprised to find he isn’t lying.

“You said before you didn’t know what you’d do after reunification. Do you now?”

Bruce nods. “I’m leaving Gotham.”

He isn’t looking, but he can feel the emptiness in his tone as Jonathan asks “Why?”

“I’m useless here. The only way I can help is with my money, and Alfred can manage that as well as me. Better, probably. I need to be able to make a real difference.”

Jonathan says nothing, so Bruce continues. It feels good to say this out loud, to someone who he knows won’t try to convince him to stay, like Jim or Selina would. 

“I couldn’t keep anyone safe. I promised Jeremiah, and look what happened to him. To Alfred. To Selina.” He takes a deep breath. “You and Jim are the only people I have left. And I can’t help Jim hunt you down.”

Jonathan reaches over and takes Bruce’s hand. “I’m good at hiding.”

“You should get out too, while you can.”

“You know I can’t. I can’t leave them.”

Bruce nods sadly. “I know.”

The sound of footsteps on metal begins at the bottom of the barricade. It’s time to switch shifts.

Jonathan moves next to Bruce. “Goodbye.” He rests his hand on Bruce’s cheek, slowly tracing his jawline and upper lip. Bruce only allows his eyes to fall closed because he knows he won’t be able to see Jonathan, to try and memorize him, in this impenetrable dark.

“What was that?” Bruce asks, his voice low. He hasn’t known what he and Jonathan are, and he hasn’t dared to ask, but this feels like - something.

There is a pause, and Bruce can imagine Jonathan tilting his head to the side, forehead crinkling in thought, almost as clearly as if he could see it. 

“A kiss?” Jonathan says, unsure.

Bruce thinks that, even if he’s still unsure what that was, he would very much like to kiss Jonathan, and he says so.

Immediately, Jonathan removes himself from Bruce’s side, moving several feet away at an incredible speed. “No,” he says. “No.”

“Okay.” Bruce isn’t sure why Jonathan reacted that way, but he can hear the footsteps of the next guard rapidly approaching, and he knows he doesn’t have time to ask. 

Jonathan walks back to Bruce, kneeling beside where Bruce sits. He runs his fingers over Bruce’s cheek again, somehow both softer and with more intent behind it than before. “A kiss,” he says.

Bruce nods, and he knows that while Jonathan can’t see him, he can feel the movement. Slowly, he places his hand over Jonathan’s. “Goodbye,” he says.

“Good luck,” Jonathan says. “I hope you find what you’re looking for.”

Jonathan pulls his hand away. “I’ll miss you,” Bruce says, and he doesn’t know if Jonathan is still there to hear him.

Moments later, the footsteps reach the guard platform. 

“Alright, you’re good to go,” they say. It’s Harper. “Happy reunification day.”

“Happy reunification day,” Bruce echoes. He feels hollow, and he knows Harper can tell.

“You okay, kid?” 

“Yeah,” Bruce lies. “Just tired.”

“Well, get some rest. Big day ahead.”

Bruce walks down from the barricade in silence. He does not go to his cot. Instead, he walks to Gotham airport and boards a plane. He doesn't look away until first Selina’s figure on the runway, then the airport, and finally all of Gotham city is a speck on the landscape.

Jonathan walks away from the barricade, locking away all traces of emotion, preparing himself to tell his followers the news. Tomorrow will bring light. It will bring fear, enacted upon them instead of by them. They will have to hide, adapt. But the power of fear, of the Scarecrow, will never die.

*

Bruce is thirty-one. His birthday was last week, and as expected, he had thrown the party to beat all parties. Dick had taken over Batman duties for the night (though only after weeks of him and Alfred teaming up on Bruce to convince him), and anyone who was anyone in Gotham had taken advantage of Wayne Manor’s open bar until the sun came up. 

Jonathan had not been there, but that was to be expected. That sort of thing was as far from his comfort zone as possible. Instead, he had attempted a robbery of Wayne Tech that Dick had stopped. Bruce thinks that trying to rob him is probably Jonathan’s idea of a birthday present.

Today, Bruce is once again surrounded by a crowd at Wayne Manor, but for a very different reason. Today, Bruce is hosting a fundraiser/recognition ceremony for Gotham’s firefighters. With all the buildings Jeremiah — Joker, now — has been blowing up recently, and with Firefly’s recent crime spree, they deserve it.

After Bruce gives his speech, the donations start to flow in, and he quietly slips out into the back garden. 

It is still early in the day for a fundraiser, so the sun is still up, though it isn’t visible behind the trees that surround the manor. The light is orange and most of the extensive gardens are covered in shadow. A small fountain bubbles in a pond not far away.

Jonathan sits on the brick edge of the pond. He isn’t wearing his mask, and it looks like he might have attempted to brush his hair. The paint he wears as the Scarecrow is mostly smudged off, but there are still traces of it below his eyes.

“Happy birthday,” he says with a smile.

Bruce smiles back. He doesn’t mention the attempted robbery. Instead, he sits beside Jonathan on the bricks and gently touches Jonathan’s cheek in what they both recognize as a kiss. 

They must make quite a picture, Bruce thinks. So much of his life is for the paparazzi. Speculation on his personal life appears in the tabloids at least once a month, often accompanied by grainy, ultra-zoomed-in photos of people who sometimes aren’t even him. Even the Batman is the subject of intense media speculation (and, one memorable time, a manhunt). But this is private.

The windows of Wayne Manor are lit up, and the chatter and laughter from his guests float out into the garden, where billionaire Bruce Wayne sits in a suit, cross-legged on the bricks, next to the Scarecrow, who is smiling contently. The tabloids would go wild, Bruce thinks wryly.

“Dance with me?” Bruce asks.

Jonathan takes his hand.

There is no music, but it doesn’t matter. Bruce knows from experience that Jonathan will step on his toes painfully if they try to do anything more complicated than holding each other in a bad approximation of a slow dance. He’s never figured out if Jonathan does it on purpose or if he is that bad at dancing, and he would believe either option.

A light wind begins to blow, and for what might be the first time in Gotham, it isn’t chill, doesn’t cut to the bone. This wind is almost warm in the last rays of the afternoon sun. They dance badly in the failing sunlight and for the first time in what feels like forever, Bruce is at peace.

**Author's Note:**

> hope yall enjoyed! if you did im on tumblr also @alpacasandravens, or leave a comment/kudos they're what keep me writing!


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